Departed
by Arcana Major
Summary: "There was something about the package waiting on Artie's desk when Leena arrived that morning, that set her teeth on edge."
1. Nightmares exist outside of logic

**Title: **Departed

**Summary: "**There was something about the package waiting on Artie's desk when Leena arrived that morning, that set her teeth on edge."

**Disclaimer: **I own none of the characters of '_Warehouse 13_' or '_Alan Wake_'. The rights belong to Syfy & Remedy Entertainment. I do not use them for any means of fiscal gain.

* * *

There was something about the package waiting on Artie's desk when Leena arrived that morning, that set her teeth on edge. It looked relatively normal. A brown cardboard box tied together with string. But it just felt wrong.

There was no postage label, or really any discerning features whatsoever, except for the words 'WAREHOUSE 13' printed across the top in thick, black letters, as if written by a typewriter. For a second, she almost swore she could almost hear a faint tapping noise in the back of her mind.

Pulling on a pair of gloves that had been discarded on the desk, she cut the strings holding the box closed and carefully opened it.

Inside was a stack of paper, on the topmost of which was written, in the same font as the box, 'DEPARTURE by Alan Wake'. It seemed so ordinary. Just a simple manuscript, that for some reason, someone, somewhere had decided needed to be confined to America's attic.

Setting the mainframe to search for any references to this Alan Wake. She began to flick through some of the pages. She lost herself in the words on the paper; Bright Falls and the dark presence inhabiting it. So engrossed was she that she didn't notice the discarded title page that happened to brush the exposed skin of her arm.

She jumped as images, emotions and sensations flooded her mind. Frustration; deep paralysing terror; yawning, empty darkness that threatened to swallow her whole. She staggered back, clutching at the desk trying to regain her balance; trying desperately to shake off the last remnants of the cloying darkness that clung to her mind.

A window appeared on the computer monitor, announcing the results of her earlier search. There were a surprising number of hits; book reviews, announcements of television appearances, newspaper articles reporting his altercation with a member of the press and debating on his current mental state as a result, posts by a user listed as 'Rosey_Gold' on various forums. Scrolling through the rest of results of varying degrees of relevance, she instead changed the search parameters for any official records that could give her more information on why his manuscript of what was reputed to be his latest novel had appeared in the Warehouse.

Recently there had been a charge on the account of an Alice Wake; reservations for a 'Stuckey's Cabins' in a town called Bright Falls. No other recent transactions. Nothing for Alan either; there was a vague police report concerning a possible DUI filed a week ago but that was it. It was like he'd dropped off the face of the Earth.

Her eyes flicked to the innocuous pile of paper again. Tentatively she reached out to it again, bracing herself for the same images that had assaulted her before.

Nothing happened.

She released a breath. She continued to skim through the pages; Wake had written himself in as the protagonist of his own novel and yet his protagonist-self was seemingly none the wiser to why events were unfolding around him.

Something about this was incredibly wrong. She could feel a strange oppressive presence begin to press at the back of her mind.

Despite her growing apprehension, she persevered. She followed Alan as he tried to find his missing wife; his pursuit of her supposed kidnapper; his altercations with the FBI Agent, Nightingale; and the psychiatrist Hartman; all the way beset by bizarre eldritch forces.

The lights briefly flickered, a low chill creeping into the room. The pressure on her mind was building. She kept going.

Discovering the Lady of the Light; the revelation of what had caused his wife's disappearance; being manipulated by the Dark Presence into trying to engineer its freedom; using the spirit of Thomas Zane, already snared by the darkness during its previous escape attempt, to free himself; the journey to the Well-Lit Room; discovering the sole remaining pages of Zane's manuscripts and the Clicker; venturing into the Dark Place and finally banishing the abomination now inhabiting the body of the woman once known as Barbara Jagger.

In her mind's eye she could almost see the murky depths of the Dark Place, everything shifting and mutable. A pale and mottled face obscured by a black funeral veil superimposed over everything. And right in the centre, the house. The only 'real' thing in this world of half-formed ideas, conceptions of thought; the elsewheres and neverweres.

There was light shining from the highest window, trying in vain to hold back the dark. The writer struggling desperately to leash the forces that he had set loose.

There was a whisper against her mind. She needed to help him. Her energy lent to his. Her words with his:

A-l-a-n-f-e-l-t-a-p-r-e-s-c-e-n-c-e-a-l-o-n-g-s-i-d-e-h-i-m-.-S-o-m-e-o-n-e-s-o-f-a-r-a-w-a-y-.

With a gasp she dropped the pen that she had unknowingly picked up. The words she had written blurred and twisted until they were absorbed by the manuscript, becoming one with the words already at home there. Horror gripped her. This was dangerous, if this manuscript was ever tampered with then the darkness contained within could be released. She dreaded to think what would happen if this ever came into contact with Edgar Allen Poe's pen. There was only one place this could go; the Dark Vault.

Hurriedly, she collected up all the pages she had left lying loose as she read and assembled them back into a pile. Pulling a roll of purple string from a drawer by her side, she cut two lengths, and quickly tied them round the manuscript. The string was infused with neutraliser, it wasn't strong enough to contain the artifact but it would keep it quiet until she could get it safely contained in the Dark Vault.

Grabbing a bag from the back of Artie's chair, she shoved the manuscript inside and ran down into the Warehouse proper.


	2. Little fun to be had in explanations

**Title: **Departed

**Summary: "**There was something about the package waiting on Artie's desk when Leena arrived that morning, that set her teeth on edge."

**Disclaimer: **I own none of the characters of '_Warehouse 13_' or '_Alan Wake_'. The rights belong to Syfy & Remedy Entertainment. I do not use them for any means of fiscal gain.

* * *

The Warehouse had always felt like home to her; there was something comforting walking among the shelves laden with all the weird and wonderful the world had to offer: the soft yellow light from the Shelby bulbs overhead, the smell of dust and faint tang of ozone, the ticks and whirs of all the artifacts lying dormant, almost like a heartbeat.

Now something had changed.

The shelves loomed menacingly above her. Oppressive shadows clung to every surface, pooling below the shelves and on the floor. The lights hanging above her, built to never fail, were struggling to hold back the darkness that was encroaching on her.

She could make out faint, flickering, inconsistent shapes moving between the aisles; like something half-glimpsed out of the corner of your eye.

Desperately she ran forward, rows upon rows of shelves flicking past in the half-light. She ran without seeing, driven by a terror so strong it felt primal in nature. The fear of the unknown; of what might be hiding out there in the darkness.

Voices began to echo around here. Their words indistinct, as if they too couldn't escape the darkness.

Her heartbeat pounded in her ears, her breath ragged. She skidded to a halt as a loud pop sounded behind her. She whipped round to look for the noise.

One of the bulbs had blown out.

With a start she watched as the one next to it exploded in a shower of spark; then another, then another. One by one each of the bulbs, lighting the path she had travelled, shattered plunging the aisle into darkness. She turned frantically as the lights ahead of her all suffered a similar fate.

She was alone, isolated in a single circle of light. The darkness around her seemed to thicken and heave, almost as if dictated by invisible currents. She backed away as far as she could, before she hit the shelves behind her.

The shapes began to resolve themselves into figures, watching her from behind the shelf opposite her. So many different impressions assaulted her mind: white-hot fury and rage, terror, the cold calculation of a predator observing its prey.

"My dear, thank you for remembering our appointment."

Her head snapped up. The voice had come from near her, from inside the darkness. As she stared, she swore she could see a familiar shadow waiting out in the darkness.

The shadow of James MacPherson.

"No. Not you."

The voice spoke again. It seemed to permeate the atmosphere around her.

"A gift, for me? You shouldn't have."

"No. No..."

She sank to the floor as memories came flooding back to her. His voice whispering inside her head. Fingers on her spine. Caged in her own mind as he reshaped and reformed it, moulding it to his desires. Screaming out at the darkness for anyone to hear her.

"What a beautiful specimen."

She huddled in on herself, trying to shield herself from the voice. The light around her began to fade as the darkness encroached on her. Eating away at her protection; implacable and unrelenting.

"Not again. Not again. Not again. Not again." She muttered under her breath.

The darkness kept swelling around her, black as pitch.

The voice spoke again. This time it sounded like another voice was speaking with MacPherson, subtly echoing his words. An old woman's voice.

"Your mine now, my dear..."

With a final surge, she was engulfed in darkness.


	3. Antithetical to the poetry of fear

**Title: **Departed

**Summary: "**There was something about the package waiting on Artie's desk when Leena arrived that morning, that set her teeth on edge."

**Disclaimer: **I own none of the characters of '_Warehouse 13_' or '_Alan Wake_'. The rights belong to Syfy & Remedy Entertainment. I do not use them for any means of fiscal gain.

* * *

There was nothing.

No light, no sound, no warmth. Just a vast empty void.

She couldn't feel or see her body, like her mind had been cast adrift.

She was submerged in the shadows.

_"It's not a lake, it's an ocean..."_


	4. But there can be no explanation

**Title: **Departed

**Summary: "**There was something about the package waiting on Artie's desk when Leena arrived that morning, that set her teeth on edge."

**Disclaimer: **I own none of the characters of '_Warehouse 13_' or '_Alan Wake_'. The rights belong to Syfy & Remedy Entertainment. I do not use them for any means of fiscal gain.

* * *

Time passed. Aeons, minutes, years, days.

She felt something.

Something was pulling at her. Slowly but resolutely as though determined to reach her.

Something pierced the void. A light. Infinitely tiny against the unknowable vastness of this ocean, but there nonetheless.

It was so far away, but she could feel it getting closer as continued to be pulled in.

Something was throwing her a lifeline. Realising this, she clung on with all she was worth; willing herself towards the light with the desperation of the drowning.


End file.
